Concern was raised by tax practitioners regarding medical
expenses that are disallowed by SARS and added back

Clarity was given that
if Tax payers / practitioner do not provide SARS with proof of medical expenses
or supporting documents at the required time, SARS will automatically disallow
the expenses due to non-compliance. Tax practitioners also requested an updated
policy on how medical aid is calculated and what is allowed and not allowed,
they requested that the information to also be made available on SARS website.

SARS correspondence:

Phoning project: team
members who are working on the project that phones taxpayers regarding their
outstanding tax affairs / documents refuse to send e-mails or original letter
to the tax practitioners, regarding the cases they are calling them for, and
the tax practitioners don’t feel comfortable to discuss their client’s
financial and tax related matters telephonically due to the scams that are on.

The matter was not
discussed and the way forward will be given on the next meeting because the
representative from Audit was not available to respond

SARS
unlawfully added back director’s remuneration expenditure on company assessment
and the reason given was: Non-compliance by a director with hispersonal tax. –

The issues was not
discussed because the representative from audit was not available it will be
discussed on the next meeting.

Long delay
with SDL activations when PAYE & UIF are already active, and Procedure to
be followed to activate SDL registration:

Tax practitioners were advised to make their request in
writing when they want to re-activate / register for SDL only (not necessary to
completed EMP 101),

SARS also explained to the practitioners that when
activating/ registering for SDL the delay is caused by department of labour
because once a letter is received from the tax practitioners SARS sends it to department
of labour so that they can approve SETA codes first.

NEW MATTERS

Appointments
at pavilion:

Tax practitioners were concerned that it is still taking long
to be allocated with appointment in Pavilion. And they also raise concern
regarding the quality of service provided by Doringkloof branch office. Amongst
the things tax practitioners were not happy about in Doringkloof is the issue
of Certified I.D copies, tax practitioners are always sent back and denied
assistance by Doringkloof stall members because the I.D copies presented by the
tax are poor quality. Whenever tax
practitioners request to speak to the branch manager regarding the issue she is
forever not available to come and assist / look or advice on the matter, and
the team leaders are unable assist as well.

It was
however explained to the tax practitioners that due to audit findings there
were some discrepancies regarding authentication and quality of I.D copies that
branch offices should accept, and therefore the staff members of the mentioned
branch office were trying to be extra cautious, however the matter will be
escalated to the branch manager

The
taxpayer is authorised to handle the taxpayer affairs. Engagements will be made
to ensure that taxpayers are not unnecessary / inconveniently sent back.

Tax
practitioners also mentioned dissatisfaction about the level of skills in
Pretoria North Branch office. And it was also explained to them that branch
office is still new, however skills development projects are underway so as to
ensure that the level of service provided is up to required standard and
uniform with all other branch offices.

Tax
practitioner were also concerned about validity of stamp on the certified I.D
(which is currently 3 months): SARS explained to the tax practitioner that
sometimes tax payers change practitioners and therefore by have recent
certified I.D copy will give indication that we are servicing authorised
person.

There was a concern
raise by tax practitioners regarding capacity in Pavilion: SARS acknowledged
the concern and indicated that there are plans
in pipeline to resolve the capacity issue, however practitioners in the
meantime were encouraged to also go to Pretoria North and Doringkloof branch
office for simple queries.

Tax
practitioners were also concerned about scanning of POA & I.D copies for
each query by Pavilion staff: and they also requested that when SARS is
implementing those kind of changes there must be communication on the WEBSITE
under " what’s new” so that
they can also be aware.

· Allocation of case numbers: Some other staff members
are still refusing to give case numbers to practitioner. SARS emphasised to the
practitioner that case numbers by staff members shouldn’t be negotiable,
engagements will be made to staff member regarding issuing of case numbers.

· PAYE JOURNALS: sometimes they look
chaotic in the account, on one period you will find 2 pages full of journals
money taken in and out of the account. It was explained to tax practitioners
that when payments are without using correct PRN the system will randomly
allocate payments from the oldest case, and if the payments are late monies
will first be allocated to penalty, then interest and tax. One of the factors
considered before Journals are posted on the account is the net effect of the
account. There was also a concern regarding EMP 501 payments that do not
reflect on the system, tax practitioners were advised to send e-mail to Ms
Sibongile Mtshali Jack for any accounts related matters that they are unable to
resolve them on e-filing or branch office.

One of the concerns raised regarding journals is that
they account gets fixed and the practitioners even obtain TCC but when they
apply on the following year same problem arise. Sometimes even if there is nil
declarations there will be journals on the account which are creating a debit. Matter will be escalated to account s maintenance for
further investigation.

· SARS CORRESPONDENCE: taxpayer are requested to
submit supporting documents for audit purposes and in most cases they submit
the documents via e-filing and the documents don’t upload into SARS system
which results into input to be added back and create debit on the account, and
that leads to ADR1 which takes 90 working days to be finalised and even after
90 days most of them don’t even get resolved.The issue about supporting documents not uploading
will be escalated to business developers to investigate the reason for documents
scanned mainly from e-filling why they do not upload to SARS system; there is a
possibility of a technical related problem.

Cases older than 5 years: SARS cannot revise
assessments for cases older than 5 years, but there are cases where taxpayer
has proof that the case / return was submitted within 5 year period:

SARS emphasised that it
shouldn’t be a problem where there is proof, however if such cases don’t get
resolved they need to be escalated by consultants to the team leader, team leader to the branch
manager.

IT12EI are submitted but assessments don’t get
finalised, tax practitioner were requested to give examples to e-filing team
for further investigation.

E-filing : request was made by practitioners to increase capacity from
2MB because of the of documents they submit on e-filing, if it exceeds 2 MB
they are forced to submit other documents manually and it sometimes causes a
delay in finalising assessments sometimes they get missing, the issue will be
discussed with the system developers.

PCC- North e-mail: when the practitioners send
queries via the PCC North e-mail they get messages that the mailbox is full: it
was confirmed that the mailbox is consistently monitored. And tax practitioners
were advised not to submit ADR1 via the e-mail due to security reasons. , the
e-mails meant for correspondence not legal documents such as ADR1.

Societies which are not companies:
Procedure to be followed to register them: tax practitioners want to know
procedure to be followed when registering an association because when they
submit IT77C SARS posts back to them and advise them to complete IE but the
form requires taxnumber. Tax practitioners were advised that Tax Exempt Unit
should facilitate the registration. Few examples were given.

NOO:they are disallowed and the tax
practitioners are advised to submit NOA or resubmit again and the second
submission also gets rejected and advice is given to re-submit and the reason
for rejection is always not clear (few of those reasons are: sequence incorrect
of invalid objection and the system doesn’t give further clarity as to how is
the sequence incorrect or how is it invalid.. case will be escalated to
business systems. Tax practitioner were also advised that if they want to
correct the assessment they can make a request for correction instead of NOO
however if there was audit on the assessment system will not allow RFC. Tax
practitioner were requested to communicate with Anise Botha should they
experience problem with NOO.

New IT4 & TRUST returns:No space for accumulated
loss and other items that are on the company balance sheet, Foreign companies
don’t have share capital: the issue will be escalated to business systems but
there were examples given.

IRP 6 once it’s captured the basic
amount changes:SARS requested few examples so that they can be escalated for
further investigation.

E-mails and SMS sent by SARS when
returns/statement of accounts is requested:E-mail or SMS is sent by SARS to
notify the tax practitioners what was requested. It was explained to the practitioner that for
security purposes it is important to send confirmation to the taxpayer.

IT77 and other forms:must be made available on
PDF format to enable the practitioners to type on them so as to prevent
capturing errors. Also for security reasons registration process will remain
the same, however examples of capturing errors were requested for further
investigation.

The link to automatically register new companies is no
longer available due to changes if CIPC system.

Dividends tax: Deadline of March 2013 for
submission of supporting data: Tax practitioners confirmed the issue was dealt
with.

SARS withdrawals out of taxpayer’s
bank accounts: Tax practitioner also confirmed that the issued was handled
and dealt with.

4. CLOSURE

The
chairperson thanked all the attendees and declared the meeting officially closed.

WHY REGISTER WITH SAIT?

Section 240A of the Tax Administration Act, 2011 (as amended) requires that all tax practitioners register with a recognized controlling body before 1 July 2013. It is a criminal offense to not register with both a recognized controlling body and SARS.

MINIMUM REQUIREMENTS TO REGISTER

The Act requires that a minimum academic and practical requirments be set to register with a controlling body. Click here for the minimum requirements of SAIT.